How To Minimize Measurement Errors In Solar Cell Testing

By Newport Corporation

With the increasing interest in photovoltaics as an alternative energy source, the solar sector is challenged to find more efficient and reliable electrical performance from PV cells, modules and vast solar panel arrays. Solar cells, the smallest of all photovoltaic devices, generate very little electrical power but are extremely useful in PV research that can be applied to devies of all sizes.

Cells, which range in size from 0.01 cm² to 6 inches in diameter, are used either as irradiance sensors or for studying new PV materials and processes. A research or prototype cell may simple be a thin film of photovoltaic material sandwiched between two glass microscope slides with silver paint for contacting.